In the days of our grandfathers, a young warrior named Plain Feather lived near Mount Hood. His guardian spirit was a great elk. The great elk taught Plain Feather so well that he knew the best places to look for every kind of game and became the most skillful hunter in his tribe.
Again and again his guardian spirit said to him, “Never kill more than you can use. Kill only for your present need. Then there will be enough for all.”
Plain Feather obeyed him. He killed only for food, only what he needed. Other hunters in his tribe teased him for not shooting for fun, for not using all his arrows when he was out on a hunt. But Plain Feather obeyed the great elk.
Smart Crow, one of the old men of the tribe, planned in his bad heart to make the young hunter disobey his guardian spirit. Smart Crow pretended that he was one of the wise men and that he had had a vision.
In the vision, he said, the Great Spirit had told him that the coming winter would be long and cold. There would be much snow. “Kill as many animals as you can,” said Smart Crow to the hunters of the tribe. “We must store meat for the winter.”
The hunters, believing him, went to the forest and meadows and killed all the animals they could. Each man tried to be the best hunter in the tribe. At first Plain Feather would not go with them, but Smart Crow kept saying, “The Great Spirit told me that we will have a hard winter. The Great Spirit told me that we must get our meat now.”
Plain Feather thought that Smart Crow was telling the truth. So at last he gave in and went hunting along the stream now called Hood River. First he killed deer and bears. Soon he came upon five bands of elk and killed all but one, which he wounded.
Plain Feather did not know that this was his guardian elk, and when the wounded animal hurried away into the forest, Plain Feather followed. Deeper and deeper into the forest and into the mountains he followed the elk tracks.
At last he came to a beautiful little lake. There, lying in the water not far from the shore, was the wounded elk. He heard a voice say clearly, “Draw him in.” And something drew Plain Feather closer to the wounded elk.
“Draw him in,” the voice said again. And again Plain Feather was drawn closer to the great elk. At last he lay beside it. “Why did you disobey me?” asked the elk. “All around you are the spirits of the animals you have killed. I will no longer be your guardian. You have disobeyed me and slain my friends.”
Then the voice which had said, “Draw him in,” said, “Cast him out.” And the spirits cast the hunter out of the water, onto the shore of the lake.
Weary in body and sick at heart, Plain Feather dragged himself to the village where his tribe lived. Slowly he entered his teepee and sank upon the ground. “I am sick,” he said. “I have been in the dwelling place of the lost spirits. And I have lost my guardian spirit, the great elk. He is in the lake of the lost spirits.”
Then he lay back and died. Ever after, the Indians called that lake the Lake of the Lost Spirits. Beneath its calm blue waters are the spirits of thousands of the dead. On its surface is the face of Mount Hood, which stands as a monument to the lost spirits.
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